1785. Grose, Dict. Vulg. Tongue, s.v.
1859. Matsell, Vocabulum, or Rogue’s Lexicon. Faithful. A tailor
that gives long credit. ‘I say, Sam, what kind of crib was that you
cracked?’ ‘Oh! it belonged to one of the faithful.’
Faithful Durhams, subs. phr. (military).—The Sixty-Eight Foot.
Fake, subs. (common).—An action; a proceeding; a manœuvre; a mechanical
contrivance—an affair of any kind irrespective of morals or legality:
generally used in a sense specifically detrimental. In America, a
swindler. [Origin dubious: Barrère says, ‘a very ancient cant word,’
but gives no evidence. Fakement (q.v.) appears to be the older subs.
form (1785), while the verbal usage is traced to Ainsworth’s ‘fake
away’! in Rookwood (1834). Conjecturally derived from the Latin facere,
to make, to do: compare to which the French slang use of faire.]
1827. Maginn, in Blackwood’s Mag. ... the fogle-hunters doing Their
morning fake in the prigging lay.
[Circa 1850, but date uncertain.] ‘Bates’ Farm.’ I’m up to every
little fake, But in me there’s no harm.
1851–61. H. Mayhew, London Lab. and Lon. Poor, vol. I., p. 237.
After that we had a fine fake—that was the fire of the Tower of
London—it sold rattling.
1871. London Figaro, 21 Oct. Yet they’ve been known for many a fake
To coolly set a trap.
1883. Greenwood, Tag, Rag, and Co. Naming the house in the
ridiculous way it was named was merely a fake to draw attention to
it.
1888. New York Mercury. Both ladies then came to the conclusion
that the fortune-teller was a fake, and they decided to notify the
police.
1889. Globe, 23 July, p. 2, col. 2. Good Gladstonites, flock up and
take One bottle of the Parnell fake.
Verb (common).—1. To do anything; to fabricate; to cheat; to deceive,
or devise falsely; to steal; to forge. A general verb-of-all-work. In
America fix (q.v.) is employed much in the same way, whilst the French
slang has faire; maquiller; aquiger or quiger; and goupiner.
[In combination to fake a screeve = to write a begging letter; to
fake one’s slangs = to file through one’s fetters; to fake a cly
(q.v.) = to pick a pocket; to fake the sweetener = to kiss; to fake
the duck = to adulterate, to dodge; to fake the rubber = to stand
treat; to fake the broads = to pack the cards, or to work the
three-card trick; to fake a line (theatrical) = to improvise a
speech; to fake a dance, or a step, or a trip (theatrical) = to
perform what looks like, but is not, dancing.]
1851–61. H. Mayhew, London Lab. and Lon. Poor, vol. I., p. 390. The
ring is made out of brass gilt buttons, and stunning well: it’s
faked up to rights, and takes a good judge even at this day to
detect it without a test.
1861. Reade, Cloister and Hearth, ch. lv. There the folk are
music-bitten, and they molest not beggars, unless they fake to
boot, and then they drown us out of hand.